


Bleak Midwinter

by SophiaCatherine



Series: Coldwave Winter Week 2018 [1]
Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Frostbite, Hypothermia, M/M, Serious Injuries, Violence, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 20:11:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17066309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SophiaCatherine/pseuds/SophiaCatherine
Summary: The job was a mistake.





	Bleak Midwinter

**Author's Note:**

> For Coldwave Winter Week 2018. Day 2: Mobsters. ‘Extra’: frostbite.
> 
> M rating is for violence and whump.

The job was a mistake.

The Santinis beat the shit out of Len and left him out in the snow, unconscious.

Mick had been biting his nails, watching from the sofa as Len marked up his blueprints of the little art museum that was expecting a touring Monet. “Don’t worry, Mick,” Len had said, as confident as the little shit always was when he had a plan. “I know what I’m doing.

He tried to tell himself that Len wouldn’t be doing this if he wasn’t sure. Leonard Snart didn’t take risks on the job. And yet here they were, with something uneasy flaring in Mick’s chest. “What if the Santinis get wind of this?”

“ _Please_. They got out of the East Side of town a long time ago. They’re not interested.”

“It’s a Monet. I think they’re gonna remember where their territory borders are.” Mick swallowed, remembering a guy from an old crew who took a job in Santini territory without permission. He’d been unrecognizable when the firefighters pulled him out of the locked warehouse.

At the table, Len had waved an oblivious hand. “Stop worrying, Mick. I’ve got everything accounted for. It’ll be fine.”

It wasn’t fine.

The crew had the Monet _in_ _the_ _van_ when Mick felt a gun pressed to the side of his head, and how had Len not fucking seen this coming?

“On the ground, Rory,” said Ira Santini’s gruff voice.

On the other side of the van, he could hear Joey Santini yelling at Len about _territory_ and _precedent_ and _fucking_ _nobodies_ _who_ _take_ _what_ _belongs_ _to_ _the_ _Families_.

They shot Parker when he tried to run. Mick didn’t see what they did with the body, still on his knees with his hands linked behind his head.

The sound of fists and feet against fragile flesh echoed again and again around the empty parking garage, punctuated by occasional grunts. Len never made much noise when someone was beating on him.

Mick shook against the gun at his temple, but didn’t move.

“Thanks _so_ _much_ for providing us with transportation,” Ira said, shoving Len, Mick and the two remaining crew into the back of the van. There was a knee in Mick’s back, the brutal crack of a rib, and then darkness.

When he came to, his hands were cuffed behind his back. A searing stab of pain in his back pulled a snarl out of him. He dragged his head up to look out of the window, trying to figure out where they were headed.

They were way past the city borders and on the way to Keystone when two of the Santinis dragged a now-unconscious Len out of the van. They pulled off half his clothes—he moaned weakly but didn’t fight them. They left him there, on the edge of the road, in the snow.

Then they drove away, back in the direction of Central.

“It’s 20 degrees out there,” Mick tried to say, his own head spinning with what was probably a concussion. Some of the words made it out.

“Not our problem,” Joey said from the front of the van.

They kicked Mick and the others to the curb, literally, on the front steps of CCPD. Mick almost envied their chutzpah, driving away from the precinct with a van full of Santinis and a fucking Monet.

Even for the middle of the night, it was too quiet out front of the CCPD, and Mick almost laughed. “Let’s get out of here,” he hissed, heading for the back alley.

When he turned around, Willis and Evans had split.

 _Fine_.

Mick stumbled towards a car. A wave of dizziness hit, and then he was on the floor. _Well_ , _shit_. He wasn’t driving tonight, not unless he wanted to end up in a ditch too.

He dragged himself up and pulled out his phone, Lisa’s name standing out as he flicked through contacts, but—there was no way. He scrolled on through lists of people he wouldn’t trust to give him the time of day, never mind with this.

He ended up on the bus out of town, staring out at slow lights fading into the dark of the country road, counting the minutes Len had been out in the snow.

The panic sat heavy in his chest. He was fighting it, and the cold, to breathe as he stumbled through the dark on the icy road. But at last he found him, barely awake and curled into a ball. Mick pulled off his jacket and wrapped it around him, as gently as he knew how. Len’s hands were squeezed together in white-knuckled fists. In a slow, careful movement, Mick pried one open. It was red and cracked, fingertips already turning black.

He flagged down a passing truck. The driver didn’t say a word when Mick lifted a bloody, half-conscious man into the cab with him.

* * *

It was cold back at the safe house. Mick had carried Len in and up the stairs. Now he lifted him onto the bed, the only piece of furniture they’d bothered with, other than a table for laying out blueprints.

Len moaned when his skin touched rough sheets and blankets.

They had some heating—they’d been squatting in an office building that had only recently been abandoned—but it was just a small electric space heater. Mick brought it close to the bed anyway. He looked Len over, helpless hands hovering above his curled-up body, trying not to touch more than he had to. Where Len had kept his jeans and t-shirt, his skin was a ghastly white, but the color was returning, slowly. It was his hands and feet, left exposed in the snow for hours, that had Mick raising his own shaking hands to his head. They were swelling into hideous blisters, a gruesome shade of black beneath.

A light hand on Len’s chest felt him cold as marble.

Mick’s first aid experience was mostly with fire, but he remembered a few things he’d read about frostbite. He filled a bowl, grateful that the water hadn’t been turned off yet.

Then he removed Len’s wet clothing. Len whined as it was pulled off, inch by inch. Mick remembered bandages coming off burned skin, and tasted bile. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, but Len wasn’t responding to words. He ran a warm cloth over his limbs and torso.

Len screamed when Mick reached his blackening toes.

Mick pulled back, shuddering. He paused, ran a contrite hand over his partner’s cold head.

Then he carried on, tuning out his whimpering partner.

Later, the young mob doc—who charged outrageous fees but didn’t ask questions—said, “If he’d been there any longer…” and didn’t finish.

Mick sat in the next room with his head in his hands. He allowed himself five minutes to think about what would have happened if Len had been there any longer. Then he got up and went to find the whiskey.

* * *

Len finally stirred from sleep a few hours later.

Mick was sitting in a chair next to the bed, staring out of the window at snow falling against a backdrop of darkness.

“Hey,” Len said in a near-whisper. In the low light, Mick could see the shallow rise and fall of his chest where he lay flat and rigid.

Laboriously, Len raised one of his bandaged hands and frowned at it.

“How you doing?” Mick murmured, not meeting his eyes.

“Peachy.”

Relief flooded through Mick like an opiate—and a tight coil of rage unfurled in his stomach. “You fucking idiot,” he said, in the same low mutter.

There was a minute or two of sullen silence.

“I said we were gonna be sitting ducks. You didn’t listen.” He was spitting his words, his voice rising now. Something inside him told him he should be gentle with Len right now, but he didn’t fucking _care_. “You never do. Leonard Snart is always right. Don’t gotta listen to the _muscle_ , do you?”

Len grimaced. “Mick...”

He snorted a scornful laugh. “I had to drag you out of a fucking ditch. You could have _died_ , you bastard.” He shook his head helplessly, turning back to the window. As fast as it had arrived, the fury was draining away into exhaustion.

“Stop beating a dead horse, Mick,” Len rasped. “We’ll talk about it in the morning.”

 _Sure_ _we_ _will_ , Mick didn’t say.

His rib was still on fire, and there was nowhere else to sleep, unless he wanted to spend the rest of the night in a broken office chair. He crawled in next to Len, leaving a frigid zone between them. Len didn’t need Mick jostling him in the night.

He laid a hand, feather-light, on Len’s arm. He was a little warmer to Mick’s touch now.

Len flinched a bit, but didn’t complain.

Under a hypnagogic blanket of darkness, Mick thought he heard a whispered, “I’m sorry.”

Mick didn’t answer, but he didn’t move his hand away. Under his touch, he felt Len relax, just a little, and drift into sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Thette for looking at this for me - your positivity is so encouraging! 
> 
> Happy holidays and maybe see you on [tumblr](https://sophiainspace.tumblr.com/), [twitter](https://twitter.com/SophiaCatherin5) or pillowfort, folks.


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